Launched in 1986, originally as the MSc in Community Paediatrics, this course is part of the longest-running paediatric health MSc in London and is primarily for students looking to work in community paediatrics or child health. Our multidisciplinary Master’s degree gives you a unique opportunity to build specialist expertise in paediatrics and child health with teaching taking place at UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health in close collaboration with experts from Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children (GOSH) NHS Foundation Trust. You will gain a detailed insight into the key principles and practice of evidence-based paediatrics and child health, while also exploring more specific areas, such as acute and chronic paediatrics, immunisation, safeguarding, nutrition, growth and physical activity, and child public health. Alongside this, you will build valuable research and transferable skills, and gain first-hand experience of the latest evidence-based practice. With diverse module choices available in areas including child public health, immunisation, safeguarding, ethics and law for child health, you can shape the course towards the areas most in line with your interests and career plans.
The course is intended for professionals specialising in paediatrics and child health. The Paediatrics and Child Health (Community Child Health) MSc aims to provide an opportunity for graduates from medicine and related fields to study community issues in child health. You will build an awareness of current and future developments in paediatric medicine and community child health and gain the skills necessary to critically appraise practice and policy, and undertake independent research if the full MSc is taken. We welcome students from related disciplines such as nursing, public health, psychology, and social work, but you may have different entry pathways or module recommendations.
By the end of your Master’s degree, you will have the skills necessary to become a community health practitioner. You will be able to assess the need for child health services, help plan services, and understand the rationale and organisation of preventive child health services. You will also have an understanding of the relationship between social conditions and health and how those insights can be used to improve services.
This Master’s degree will help you understand the core principles of evidence-based paediatrics and child health.
You will learn about current and future developments in paediatric medicine and child health and gain the skills necessary to critically appraise practice and policy, and carry out independent Master’s-level research.
You will also have the academic and clinical skills you need to go into community practice. Medical graduates based in the UK can continue in their career pathway in community paediatrics.
Many of our graduates have gone on to begin or complete their specialist paediatric training, into careers as consultants in paediatrics or senior professionals in other related fields including with the NHS, government health departments, ministries of health and NGOs all over the world.*
Graduate Outcomes survey carried out by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), looking at the destinations of graduates in the 2018–2024 cohorts.